And the countdown begins..

Well, my amazing husband has been gone for a little over one week. I don't know if I should end that sentence with an "already" or "only". This deployment so far has been completely different that the last one. I think the biggest change is the fact that I have a daughter. I thought that I would be really sad at this point, but Briley has kept me smiling and busy all day long; not to mention my bestie Brooke and her son Newt have kept us both entertained. :)

The hardest thing is going from living with someone to living by yourself with a baby. Ugh, sometimes I wish that I had an extra arm just to be able to let the dogs out or to shoo the cat off the couch. It is difficult to have to do everything by yourself. Now that we are getting better at our routine I think that it'll get easier. But I guess that we will see :)

Oh, and I have Brian's address so anyone that wants it please contact me.

Here we go again

So yesterday my husband left for deployment. And with him he took my heart, and my soul, and what feels like half of my body. I love him more than words can say and miss hom so much already. This being my second deployment I thought that it would be easier, right? Wrong! If anything it feels just like I'm doing this for the first time all over again.
I know that Brian and I both felt like this deployment crept up on us some how. I don't know where the time has slipped away to; I feel like just yesterday we were at the hospital holding a just born Briley. And next thing we know, there were are standing on Devil Field in 82 degree weather surrounded by multi-cam. This time saying good bye wasn't any easier for either of us. I felt my heart literally breaking as Brian was holding Briley and kissing us both good bye for last time for 9 months. Watching Brian holding his 6 week old daughter, I could see the realization on his face as it registered how much he was actually going to be missing in the next months. I think that moment is what truly hit me the hardest and made me cry like a baby.

Going through the rest of the day wasn't so bad because I spent it with Brooke, one of my newest best friends. And we went to see our friend Monica's brand new baby boy Bryce. (By the way he is a beautiful baby boy.) But after the whole "keeping myself busy" for a few hours, I  had to do what I dreaded most: go home. As soon as I walked through the door and took care of the animals, I saw the  note that my amazingly sweet husband left me I lost it. I just leaned against the wall and let myself cry. I gave myself only 5 minutes, and then I held it together pretty well until Briley's bath and bed time. Going to sleep in my queen sized bed all alone was a sad realization that this deployment is real.

So here we are again, this time I'm not just a wife but a mother. And I  have to be strong and set an example for my daughter. We love and miss you Brian! We are so proud of you! Stay safe and come home soon. <3

I suck...

Hey y'all! I suck, I'm sorry it's so long between posts. This one is just going to be a little quick one because I have been super busy and have so much to do in the next few days. But right now I've been focused on having family time and soaking it all up for the next little while. My next post will probably be in a few days, so thanks for reading along and more importantly, being patient. :)

Pre-deployment

   Now if you are a military spouse, then you already know what those two little words mean. If you aren't then you can't fully grasp how those two little words affect a military family's life. Right now we are in the pre-deployment phase, and again for those of you that don't know, it sucks.
   Pre-depoyment means many things; one, that your soldier is about to be gone for a long period of time to a foreign country where there is more danger than most can imagine. Two, that your soldier's leadership are cramming all the paperwork and training that they should have been doing for the last month or two into the last two weeks before deployment so they are at work until some God-awful hour of the night when they should be at home soaking up the last precious days with their families. Three, spending the money that you don't really have on all the last minute things that your solider "needs" (again, according to leadership) like a 4" patch sewn on his ruck that costs $60!! Yeesh! And four, the stress and anxiety of the deployment possibly taking a toll on your relationship.
  Now for any family members reading this the first thing that you have to understand for deployment is OPSEC or operational security. This means that no dates or places related to deployment are posted on anything, ESPECIALLY on Facebook. Any information can put my soldier in danger along with others, and if you do that, I will have no problem kicking your ass. So what I CAN tell you is that Brian will be leaving soon, and he will be gone for 6-9 months to Afghanistan. If you would like to know more, send me a message and I can explain more.
 Right now, I feel that the pre-deployment phase isn't real, which I know is stupid to say because obviously it is. I can say that knowing that my husband is leaving in a short amount of time for about 6-9 months is real because I can see it in the look on his face every time he looks at Briley. I can see him staring at her and already calculating how much he is going to miss every month that he is away. And that part breaks my heart. Don't get me wrong, I am going to miss my husband more than words can say. It'll be like missing a body part. But knowing that my daughter will be missing her daddy and he will be missing her tears me up. :( I will be fine, I will adjust, I'll act like everything is okay, because I have my daughter to set an example for and to keep me strong. And we will just be counting down the days until Daddy comes home.